221 ANASTOMAT1D.E. 



Family ANASTOMATID^E. 



Anastomus oscitans (Bodd.). The Shell-Ibis. 



Anastomus oscitans (Bodd.), Jerd. B. Ind. ii, p. 765 ; Hume, Rouyh 

 Draft N. $ E. no. 940. 



The Shell-Ibis appears to breed throughout the greater part of 

 India. 



I have seen hundreds of their nests, but all in one part of the 

 country the Central Granges Doab. There they certainly lay in 

 July and August, and there each pair have their own nest a large 

 stick platform built upon high trees with from three to thirty nests 

 on the same tree. Five is, I think, the maximum, and four the 

 usual number of eggs. 



In Ceylon, according to Mr. Layard's native informants, it de- 

 fends its nest pertinaciously ; in the north it is less valorous. I 

 have robbed or seen its nest robbed a score of times, and never yet 

 saw it make the feeblest attempt e\ r er to defend its pennies. 



Writing of his experience in Oudh, Colonel L. H. Irby tells us 

 that the Shell-Ibis is " common throughout the year. At a place 

 named Kupser on the lliver Kutna, a branch of the Goomtee, this 

 bird breeds in a large colony on two or three tall trees growing on 

 the banks of the river. The nests are immense stacks or rather 

 platforms of sticks one above the other, several pairs nesting on 

 each platform without any apparent separation of the eggs, which 

 on 26th June were hard-set on and of a chalky white colour, smaller 

 than, but about the same shape as, the egg of Ardea cinerea" 



I do not question the correctness of this account : Layard tells 

 us much the same about the White Ibises in Ceylon ; but still I 

 must note that I personally have never seen any of these joint-stock 

 nests, though I must have visited at one time or another more than 

 a score of breeding-places. 



I have never seen the nests of this species intermixed with those 

 of others. Very commonly they breed quite away by themselves, 

 and I have only once (on the occasion referred to under Platalca 

 leucorodia) myself seen their nests in clo e proximity to houses ; 

 but I know that they often do choose trees in the very midst of 

 villages. 



Major C. T. Bingham writes : " On the 9th July last, I found the 

 Shell-Ibis breeding in large numbers in the centre of the village of 

 Umraha, 1 \ mile from Jusra, the second station from Allahabad, 

 on the Jubbulpore line. 



" The nests were placed on the topmost branches of large trees, 

 pcepul and neeni being invariably chosen, although there were 

 some fine mango and other trees in the neighbourhood. The nests 

 were circular platforms, some 4 inches thick and 20 inches in 



